Xi Jinping’s military show in Beijing and his alliance of autocrats may look like the dawn of a new world order, yet the economic, scientific, and military balance still tilts toward the democracies of the West.
country: North Korea
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Iran’s revolutionary regime imagined it could assure its survival by becoming an armed bunker like North Korea, ready to shoot if threatened. They seemed to forget that, for its location and resources, Iran is too important for the world to tolerate a “crazy” regime threatening vital oil routes.
South Korea had been in political crisis since December, when its conservative president attempted a power grab by declaring martial law. On Tuesday, South Koreans elected the progressive candidate Lee Jae-myung, turning the page and preparing to tackle the immense challenges facing a region on edge.
None of the major heads of state on the Asian continent has a direct link with U.S. President-elect Donald Trump, who regularly calls on America’s Far Eastern allies to “pay more” for their defense. Philippe Le Corre, professor of geopolitics, explains that military risk is a major concern in a region with many hotbeds of tension.
In South Korea, the feminist 4B movement, which rejects any intimacy with men, has been causing a stir for years. What kind of feminism is it, anyway?
Pyongyang has just ratified its new defense pact with Moscow. North Korean soldiers are deployed near Kursk, in an unprecedented engagement that marks a reversal of Kim Jong-un’s foreign policy.
With tens of thousands North Korean troops confirmed to be moving toward the Russia-Ukraine front line, to fight on Moscow’s side in Ukraine, the two big questions are: What is Kim Jong-un trying to achieve? And more importantly, how does China fit into this picture?
The United States’ confirmation of the presence of North Korean soldiers alongside the Russians in Ukraine has raised fears of an international escalation. All the more reason to fear that the current local or regional conflicts will gradually turn into global ones.
Tensions have suddenly escalated after North Korea accused South Korea of sending drones over its capital. Threats from Pyongyang are common, but amid an uncertain international context, experts are taking these latest ones more seriously.
Vladimir Putin presents himself as the leading advocate for multipolarism, but continues to reveal his true world view, where we are divided among those that respect nothing but personal power — and fools.
Moscow “killed” the body charged with overseeing the sanctions regime against North Korea — now Putin’s ally against Ukraine — dealing yet another blow to the edifice of global governance inherited from the post-war era.
A democracy is not just the vague and dangerously malleable promise of popular rule. It is instead an institutional regime or “republic” that defines and protects the rights of the people, and of individuals.
North Korea lends its full support to Russia’s war in Ukraine, and will supply ammunition to Moscow, which in return will help Kim Jong-un with his space ambitions. With the whiff of a Cold War alliance, it shows how two regimes that have become so isolated they multiply the risks for the rest of the world.
North Korea has industrialized the theft of cryptocurrency to finance its nuclear weapons program and its state-sponsored hackers are getting better at emptying digital wallets. But global law enforcement agents are in hot pursuit, and cashing in crypto is harder than ever.
What should the world make of Kim Jong-un, his young daughter Ju Ae in tow, flexing North Korea’s military hardware? Nothing good, though the scenario that it is mostly just a flex is still the most likely.
South Korean President, Yoon Suk-yeol, made a gesture of reconciliation towards Japan, the country’s former colonizer. It gives Washington hope that its two key Asian allies can overcome differences as they face an emboldened China and North Korea.
“Taiwanese would laugh at the leader worship of the North Koreans, but wasn’t that what we did in the days of Chiang Kai-shek?”
Faced with a $32 billion drop in their wealth this year, Russian oligarchs are looking for assets to allow them to overcome sanctions that will increase with the invasion of Ukraine. Familiar with crises, they see bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies as an escape from the hegemony of the dollar, and a way to diversify their holdings.
The U.S. may need to accept that Pyongyang doesn’t give up its nuclear program.
With its mineral resources and cheap labor, the country has significant potential for growth, but economic openness could undermine its dictatorship.
SEOUL – They are the simplest of dreams. To see familiar streets once more. Or walk along a river at the center of childhood memories. Or throw a big party with wine. These dreams belong to people who risked everything to flee North Korea and then, as some of the most high-profile defectors, spoke out about the rights abuses and repression of Kim Jong Un’s regime. But now, ahead of Tuesday’s summit between Kim and President Donald Trump in Singapore, the defectors are considering a question that until recently seemed foolish to ask: Could they one day return home? Such […]
Kim Jong Un’s historic call for peace also included an unspoken message to U.S. President Donald Trump: North Korea won’t surrender its nuclear weapons easily. The agreement Kim reached Friday with South Korean leader Moon Jae-in declared “a new era of peace” and sought a formal end to the seven-decade-old Korean War. While it said both countries committed to a nuclear-free Korean Peninsula, it gave no details on concrete steps to achieve it. More ominously, North Korean’s state-run media released a commentary shortly after the agreement was announced calling on the U.S. to drop its “anachronistic hostile policy” and “bad […]
North Korea may now be too dangerous to be attacked. But that may force all to find a diplomatic solution.
An Italian reporter gets a rare glimpse past the North Korean regime’s attempt to portray the country in a positive new light.
Switzerland-born globetrotter Olivier Racine does things because he can. He wanted to give the North Korean dictator two gifts from his country, a giant Toblerone chocolate bar and a piece of the Matterhorn mountain. This excerpt from his recently publish
PYONGYANG — In the Beijing airport, as I was preparing to fly to North Korea, you could practically smell the communism. Traders were checking large, beat-up bags of household items. A family was buying a large appliance in the duty-free shop. The North Koreans were easily identifiable: They were required to wear buttons with portraits […]
SEOUL — North Korea is sometimes seen as being trapped in a Stalinist time warp. And because it’s so isolated, some South Koreans think that even the way people there speak Korean is stuck in the past. It’s becoming clear that one of the biggest challenges for the nearly 28,000 North Korean escapees who now live below the border is overcoming linguistic differences. So researchers are trying new ways to help close the language divide. The North Korean accent is sometimes mocked on South Korean comedy programs for sounding quaint or old-fashioned. But Lee Song-ju says that when he speaks […]
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The Last Temptation Of Pyongyang
A visit to North Korea reveals fears about the Internet’s pernicious influence on youth, but also a big push in computer science training. The market economy calls, but ‘social control’ is at risk.
Results from the world’s large largest airline rating portal Skytrax give high marks in Asia: Exactly seven airlines in the world have been give five-star ratings: ANA (All Nippon Airways), Asiana Airlines, Cathay Pacific Airways, Hainan Airlines, Malaysia Airlines, Qatar Airways and Singapore Airlines. But at the other end of the scale is another Asian […]
Embargo? Ha! The North Korean leader relies on an entire black-market system dedicated to getting around UN sanctions so he can enjoy the best the West has to sell.
PYONGYANG — Mounted on the façade of the new Haedanghwa complex is a giant screen broadcasting slick propaganda messages. Just across the way, the “people’s ice rink” glimmers with its wavy modernist roof. On the opposite bank of the Taedong River, a dozen of 50-story-high residential buildings completed last year have helped give this area […]
KIM JONG-UN’S UNCLE EXECUTED North Korea’s official news agency KCNA announced that Kim Jong-un’s uncle and mentor, considered the second most powerful man in the country until his recent dismissal, was executed yesterday. Official media branded Jang Song-thaek a “despicable human scum” guilty of leading a “depraved life.” Read the full announcement here. CHEMICAL WEAPONS […]
Tuesday, October 14, 2014 KURDS RECAPTURE STRATEGIC KOBANI SITE Kurdish fighters battling ISIS jihadists in Kobani, Syria, near the Turkish border, announced this morning that they regained control of the strategically crucial Tall Shair hilltop following air strikes by the U.S.-led coalition. ISIS captured it more than 10 days ago. According to the Syrian Observatory […]
After rejections by Austrian and French ski-lift companies, a Swiss competitor was set to supply Pyongyang the means to realize his Alpine fantasy. But then the state stepped in.
It was a symbol of the “sunshine policy” meant to ease tensions between the two Koreas. But now, the jointly-run Kaesong facility in North Korea has been shuttered. Maybe for good.
SEOUL – The distance between the North Korean border town of Hyesan and South Korea’s capital Seoul is 440 kilometers (273 mi) as the crow flies. It took Park Kun-ha five years to complete the journey. His way turned out not only to be a lot longer but tortuous, taking him through the jungle of […]
Nuclear arms are more shield than weapon, so long as no one is suicidal.
KIEV CRACKDOWN ON FAR RIGHT Ukrainian police launched a wave of arrests against the far-right nationalist group Right Sector, after members threatened to avenge the death of their leader yesterday, The Moscow Timesreports. According to The Washington Post, a senior member of the group described it as a “counterrevolutionary activity” that they cannot accept. An […]
Why has Washington stayed so quiet about South Korean allegations of secret North Korean bank accounts?
BEIJING – It has been several weeks since North Korea conducted its third nuclear test on February 12. The international community has condemned it, and the worry expressed is unprecedented. China, in a very unusual move, summoned the North Korean Ambassador to Beijing the same day. The UN Security Council immediately made a declaration condemning […]